As British Columbia suffers from some of the highest housing costs in Canada—and the world—the Province continues to intervene in an effort to stem the bleeding for those seeking permanent shelter in the region.
Most government policies, such as this year’s attack on AirBnB and sweeping changes to condo rental rules in 2022, have observed little to no positive impact on the price tags British Columbians have been grappling with in recent years.
But that has not stopped the Province from trying.
The latest attempt places landlords, a common target, in the crosshairs. BC announced this week plans to launch a website that claims to protect tenants from “bad faith” evictions.
Starting July 18, landlords will be required to use the Landlord Use Web Portal to generate Notices to End Tenancy for personal occupancy or caretaker use, according to the Province.
“With this new tool, we’re taking action to better protect tenants from being evicted under false pretences,” stated Ravi Kahlon, Minister of Housing for BC.
The online-based tool will also “ensure that landlords who need to legitimately reclaim their units have a straightforward pathway to do so,” according to the minister.
In addition, the government believes it will gain actionable data.
“The portal will … provide government with a window to better understand when and how often these evictions occur so that we can continue to build on our work to improve services for renters and landlords,” Kahlon said.
Landlords generating notices to end tenancy will be required to include information about the persons moving into the home, the minister notes. Through this process, landlords are informed of “significant penalties” they could face if they are found to be evicting a tenant in bad faith.
On top of that, the amount of notice a tenant must receive from the landlord, and the amount of time a tenant has to dispute an eviction, are also set to double.
It’s important to note here that these seemingly well-intentioned government policies often have untended side consequences by compelling everyday landlords to pursue the very type of “bad faith” evictions that B.C. is hustling to mitigate.
In a public statement, B.C. lamented that “some landlords evict tenants under the guise of landlord use, only to rent out the unit again at a significantly higher rent.” We must ask: How responsible is the Province’s own actions for this exact scenario?
The Province claims that “changes to the process for evicting tenants for personal and caretaker use aim to support the rights and interests of both landlords and tenants,” but the policies consistently favour tenants.
For example, in 2024, landlords are restricted to raising rent by just 3.5%—far below the level of inflation Canadians are currently experiencing—and that is actually the highest figure that has been seen for several years. Previous years saw as little as 0%.
If landlords can’t legally raise their income at least in line with inflation, then of course alternative options will be considered by some. Like tenants, landlords are also humans seeking to earn a comfortable living in Canada.
“Protecting a landlord’s right to reclaim a rental unit for personal use is critical to maintaining a balanced rental housing market,” affirms David Hutniak, chief executive of LandlordBC.
Leave a Reply